Friday, December 28, 2007

Fortunately for me—and unfortunately for you—nothing too exciting happened at Christmas. That’s fortunate for me, because “exciting” usually equates to “bad”. (It’s unfortunate for you, because I have nothing to write about.)

I’m heading to the States shortly, to visit relatives, so I probably won’t be writing for a while. (Not that I’ll be gone that long.) Of course, along the lines I’ve already stated, I’m hoping I won’t have much to write about. Maybe a quick post saying “I’m back from the States, and it was a lovely trip” would be nice.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

I thought I was done shovelling snow. I shovelled three times on Sunday: once when I first got up, again when we got back from church, and a final time around 7:00 or 8:00, after the snow stopped falling.

Unfortunately, we went to a friend’s house for dinner last night. (Well, the fact that we went to her house wasn’t unfortunate. The unfortunate part is coming up.) She lives downtown, in the Bloor and Ossington area. An area where they haven’t really done a thorough job of plowing the snow. (Are you starting to get a hint of the unfortunate part that’s going to be coming? Or are you still in suspense?) In fact, there is a block of streets, off Ossington, that don’t look like they’ve been plowed at all. You drive down the street and there are two little tracks in the snow, from the left and right tires of cars that have come before me, and people have dug out little trenches for themselves, to park in. So we weren’t able to park on her street, nor the adjoining street; we had to park a block away, on another street. Again, the street hadn’t been plowed, and people had dug out little spots where they could park, but I found an empty spot. It looked like the snow was pretty deep, but I was able to take a running start at it, and I got the car in there. (Hint: The unfortunateness springs from this event.)

Just out of curiosity, once I got the car parked, I tried pulling forward and pulling back a couple of times, and realized the car wasn’t going anywhere. But I didn’t try too hard, so I figured that when it was time to leave, we’d actually be able to get out.

We had a lovely dinner—good food, good company, what could be better, etc. etc. Except that every once in a while I would think about the car, and wonder if we were going to be able to get out. On our way out, our friend asked us to bring down the shovel she had borrowed from her landlord, which we did, and put in his lobby.

When we got back to the car, we realized pretty quickly that my fears had been valid; we couldn’t get the car out. I was able to reverse pretty well, but there was a very deep patch of snow right in front of the car, and no matter how much of a running start I took at it, we couldn’t get through it.

So we went back to our friend’s house, and happened to get there just as the landlord was coming home. We told him we were friends of his tenant, and that we’d got our car stuck, and asked if we could borrow his shovel. Luckily, he didn’t mind. There were actually two shovels, which was good, because it meant that both Andrea and I were able to do some shovelling.

So I ended up having to shovel a fourth time, from our snow storm, to get our car out of its parking spot. (If you’re still in suspense, this is the unfortunate part. But, really, you should have been able to figure it out by now.)

Monday, December 17, 2007

We saw Babel on the weekend. It’s been on the PVR for a long time, and we finally got around to watching it. And I’m not really sure if I liked it or not.

I won’t bother to recount the plot, except to say that there are three separate stories going on, that turn out to be connected. And I think that was one thing that people didn’t like about the movie; according to a quick glance at Rotten Tomatoes—on which the movie only got 68%—it sounds like people are getting tired of movies with a lot of seemingly disconnected threads, that turn out to come together by the end of the movie.

Andrea did a bit more research—I think we were both trying to decide if we liked the movie or not—and one of her favourite reviewers talked about the fact that the movie is very much about fate, rather than about peoples’ actions. Looking back on the movie, everything that happened really happened to the people, and they had to simply react; it wasn’t like people were suffering the consequences of their actions, for the most part, they were just… well, suffering. Which I have to admit, I liked. We don’t always have control over our surroundings.

I do have to say, though, that I think it was silly for them to put Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett in it. Then again, maybe all of the actors in the movie were “big name” actors, from their respective countries; it could have been a star-studded cast, and I just didn’t know about it.

So all in all, I think I liked the movie. It’s not an unqualified “I loved it”, but I liked it.

Friday, December 14, 2007

I"ve written before that my typing skills used to be very good--my fingers used to FLY across the keyboard--but when I wrote a book, my typing skills got much worse, instead of better. At the time, i wrote that it was online chatting that had made my typing so much better.

unfrotunately, my typing has gottne even worse, and ironically, it's chatting that has nmade it worse. I'll explian:

When youy're chatting, there is a school of thought that you're not supposed to correct your mistakes. the point is to get the messages across quickly, so tht the flow of the conversation isn't interrupted. HOwever, I never followed that school of thought; i DID correct my mistakes, and my messages in ICQ or MSN Messenger were always properly spelled, and grammatical. (When I did make spelling mistakes, it was because I didn't know how to spell the words properly, not because I'd mis-typed them ina hurry.) I even used proper capitalization.

But lately, for some unexplainable reason, I've changed, and started getting more lackadaisical in my chatting. I"m not overly careful about capitalization, and I'm not correcting my typos unless it's critical. (i.e. if what I wrote isn't understandable; if I write "teh" instead of "the" I don't bother to correct it, because everyone knows waht it was supposed to be.) And that's all well and good for chatting, but it's spilling over into other areas, too; when I type emails, or Word documents, or blog posts, my spelling is also terrible. I spend as much time correcting myself as I do typing.

My fingers still fly across the keyboard. (People who can hear me (but not see me) are impressed at the sound of my typihg.) They're just producing garbage, instead of words.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

I took a trip to Québec City this week. It was eventful and boring all at the same time.

I had to get up at 5:00 Monday morning, in order to catch my plane, which means that the week started off very badly. Nobody likes being awake at that time, especially me. The cab was scheduled to pick me up at 6:00, and when I looked out my window at 5:55, I realized that it had snowed, and the driveway and sidewalk were covered in snow. I wish I had looked out sooner; I would have shovelled and salted, but by the time I noticed, it was too late.

The cab was a couple of minutes late, but getting to the airport, checking in, and going through security, were all a breeze. The plane was very nice, too; it was a CRJ-705, which has a personal entertainment system, with movies/TV on demand, in every seat. So I watched the first 30 minutes or so of the Bourne Ultimatum. (I knew I wouldn’t be able to finish it, but I’d already seen it, so I wasn’t worried about it. Also, there was a chance I might get to see the rest on the flight back.) Unfortunately, although I’d chosen to see the movie in English, it had Japanese subtitles. (I think it was Japanese. It looked like Kanji, to my untrained eye, but I’m very ignorant about Asian languages, so I wouldn’t be surprised at all if I were wrong.) I tried and tried to switch languages, and get rid of the subtitles, but I couldn’t figure out how.

Most of the day Monday was uneventful. I didn’t have access to my email for most of the day, which was very good—it meant I could concentrate on what I was there to talk about, instead of getting interrupted by the many, many problems back at the office in Toronto. (Many.)

We went out for lunch to a nice steak place. One of my colleagues wanted to order veal, but the waitress warned him that it wasn’t really veal, it was horse. As a slight aside, I found it interesting that people were so mortified that they’d have horse on the menu—especially since it was replacing veal, which many people find cruel in its own right. But the person involved decided against eating horse, because his daughter used to have a horse, and he figured she’d never forgive him if he ate it.

The afternoon was still uneventful, and then we went out for dinner. There were four of us—two Québecers and two Torontonians—and we took two cars. The drive was a bit unnerving, though, because when we left the parking lot, it was impossible to see out the windshields. There was so much ice, inside the windows and out, that you couldn’t see. But our hosts were used to it, I guess, and they didn’t have a problem. We had an excellent dinner, with a waitress who had a deep, raspy, smoker’s voice. (Just like the waitress I had last time I went to Québec!)

We then went for a drive, and one of my Québecer colleagues showed us the town. Which is, I must say, beautiful. It’s the oldest city in Canada—this year will be their 400th anniversary—so there were a lot of very beautiful buildings to see. I’d like to go back some time in the summer, and see the city when it’s not covered in snow.

When we got back to the hotel, I arranged with my colleague to meet at 8:30 the next morning, and we’d go and grab some breakfast, before going to the office. The room had complimentary wireless internet access, so I did a quick check of my email, before setting my alarm for 7:00. (Because that would give me enough time to meet my colleague for 8:00.)

My hotel was the Hotel Pur. It’s a very nice hotel, although a bit more “ultra modern” than I usually like. Unfortunately, it was impossible to keep my room warm. I had to turn the temperature up to approximately the temperature of the surface of the sun, so that the room would get boiling hot, and then the heat would turn off—and the room would immediately become ice cold. Until the next time the heat would kick in, and raise it to the temperature of the core of the Earth, and then turn off and start the cycle over again.

I got up at 7:00 Tuesday morning, and could barely get out of bed. In fact, for some reason, I had more trouble getting up than I had Monday, when I had to get up at 5:00. Who can explain the mysteries of the human body? (And/Or mind…) Because of the cold, I had a terrible shower, because the bathroom was frigid. (And I had one of those showers that are either boiling or freezing, but never warm.) But I managed to get ready, get packed, and get to my colleague’s door for 8:00. Now, if you’ve been reading closely, you may have noticed that I arranged with my colleague to meet him at 8:30, not 8. Which he pointed out with gentle good humour. Luckily, he was ready to go anyway, so we were able to have a nice leisurely breakfast, before showing up at the office.

Tuesday was also pretty uneventful, during the day. We worked, and we got a lot done. We had a good lunch, at a Thai place. I felt bad when I couldn’t understand the waitress, but then one of my French colleagues assured me that he couldn’t, either. I took a chance, when she asked me about the soup, and decided to get it spicy, but my gamble paid off; it was excellent. (If you like spicy food, it probably wouldn’t have been spicy enough for you, but it was just right for me.)

We weren’t sure when to leave the office, to get to the airport in time to catch our flight. As it turned out, we got there much earlier than we needed to. (Better safe than sorry, and all that.) I called Andrea, to let her know that I was coming home, and I made the mistake of asking her what the weather was like:

INT: the airport

serna remembers, at the last minute, that he needs to call Andrea before the plane leaves. He pulls out his cell phone.

serna

Hey there.

Andrea

Hey. How was the trip?

They have more small talk.

serna

So how’s the weather there?

Andrea

It’s terrrible!

serna

(with trepidation)

Oh no. What do you mean?

Andrea

Freezing rain.

serna

(hangs his head)

Crap. That’s exactly the wrong answer. If there’s any weather that will cause them to delay or cancel the flight, it’s that.

Okay, well, I’ll keep you updated, and if the flight gets delayed, I’ll let you know.

Luckily, however, the flight was not delayed. I wasn’t sure if we’d get another jet with the personal entertainment, but we did, so I was quite pleased. Unfortunately, when I went looking for The Bourne Ultimatum, they didn’t have it. So I ended up watching much of Live Free or Die Hard, instead. And, as luck would have it, again, I ended up with Japanese subtitles. I kept glancing at my colleague’s screen, to see if he had the same problem, but he didn’t. I don’t know what I could have possibly been doing wrong, but I’m convinced that it was me, not the TV. It’s just too much of a coincidence that I’d get two TVs with the same weird anomaly.

Saturday, December 08, 2007

I was at an event Thursday night, put on by METRAC, commemorating the anniversary of December 6th. It was a good event, with spoken word performances from various people. (Some of the performers work with METRAC, in the ReAct program.)

During the night my mind started to wander, as is often the case—especially when it comes to spoken word, which I can appreciate, but don’t really enjoy that much—and I started to ask myself: What’s the difference between me and the people who are performing here tonight? And there were some obvious differences: I’m older than most (or all) of them; I’m white, and most of them were youth of colour; I came from the country, and most of them came from the city; I have money, and most of them don’t. But none of those things, even though they were true, really felt like the real difference.

And then it hit me. What my subconscious had been working on in the background came to the front: I’d had encouragement. My whole life, from the time that I was a kid right up until the present day, I’ve always had encouragement.

In school, I always got fairly bad grades. But did my teachers ever tell me that I shouldn’t bother going to college or university, because I wasn’t smart enough? Did they suggest that I just give up, and go get a job pumping gas or something? Quite the opposite. Almost every report card I ever received had a note on it from my teachers, saying something to the effect that I could do better, if I would just apply myself. I was smarter than the grades I was getting, I just didn’t try, they were telling me. (In fact, it’s quite possible that I got better grades than I should have, from teachers pushing me through.) But from what I know of the kids in my Youth Group, that’s not true for youth of colour in the city schools. They have been told that they shouldn’t bother applying to college or university. They have been told that they should just give up, and go out and get menial jobs.

When they do get praise, it’s usually a guarded form of praise. People will say “wow, she’s a very good spoken word artist!” and you can almost hear, on the end of the statement, “…for a street kid.” As if living in the poor areas of Toronto, with all the lack of food and clothing and proper shelter that comes with it, also brings a lack of intelligence, or a lack of talent. We talk of “street smarts” and “book smarts” as if they’re mutually exclusive; you can either learn how to live on the streets, or you can become an engineer. But they’re both forms of being smart; they’re both ways to apply your intelligence. Who’s to say that someone with street smarts wouldn’t make a great engineer, with the right opportunities? We should never be surprised when someone who’s not so well off is intelligent, or talented. (And, of course, we shouldn’t make the opposite assumption, either, which is equally demeaning: “Oh, she’s from the streets! I bet she’s a good rapper!”)

Even to this day, when I get praise for doing a good job at work, it’s just that: straight up praise. “That was very good work you did, serna.” But people who haven’t had my advantages, who happen to be on the wrong side of the line between rich and poor, or who have the wrong colour of skin, seldom receive “pure” praise in this culture. They get qualified praise. What’s expected of me gets treated as miraculous from them.

I really think praise needs to be doled out equally. The kids in my Youth Group, some of whom are really smart and some of whom aren’t, just like the kids I grew up with, need to be encouraged. They’ll never have the advantages I did—even a poor white kid in the country is still better off than an inner-city kid—but they already know that. What they don’t know, because it’s been kept secret from them, is that they can accomplish something in this life. Some of them will even accomplish beyond their means.

Apologies for the lack of cohesion in this post. I know it’s all over the map. There were too many thing I was trying to say, and too many of them were not so well thought through.

Sunday, December 02, 2007

When I first bought my hybrid—or even ahead of time, when I was just thinking about it—a lot of people told me that they’d heard hybrids don’t actually save that much on gas. That the fuel consumption was pretty much the same as a normal Civic. Well, luckily for me, I was able to look back in my bank account, and see how much money I’d spent on gas with the previous car, for the last 90 days that I had it. And then I tracked how much I spent on gas for the new car, for the first 90 days.

And to all of the naysayers out there, I have only this to say: You were right. I only saved 23%, which is much less than I’d been hoping.

But before I continue, and get to the list of numbers that you’re all dying to see, let me just get this out of the way: I don’t regret buying the new car. In fact, I still love it. It’s a great car to drive, and it does still save me money, even if it’s not as much money as I was hoping. Sure, some of the lustre has come off, since I’m not saving as much as I’d hoped, but still, I love the car.

Now back to the numbers. First off, I guess I should share the money I spent on the two cars. Unfortunately, there is no way to find out how many kilometres I drove for the 90 days in question, in the previous car, so this isn’t really a pure “apples to apples” comparison; it’s just how much money I spent on each car, on gas. That being said, I’m fairly sure the number of kilometres for each car is probably comparable.

Cavalier

Civic Hybrid

Date

Gas

# Days

Date

Gas

# Days

May 14

$53.69

August 12

May 15

August 13

May 16

August 14

May 17

August 15

May 18

August 16

May 19

August 17

May 20

August 18

May 21

August 19

May 22

August 20

May 23

$49.47

9

August 21

May 24

August 22

$32.29

11

May 25

August 23

May 26

August 24

May 27

August 25

May 28

August 26

May 29

August 27

$29.22

5

May 30

August 28

May 31

August 29

$28.01

2

June 1

August 30

June 2

August 31

June 3

September 1

June 4

September 2

$35.07

4

June 5

September 3

June 6

September 4

June 7

$47.48

15

September 5

June 8

September 6

June 9

September 7

June 10

September 8

June 11

September 9

June 12

September 10

June 13

$50.88

6

September 11

June 14

September 12

$35.74

10

June 15

September 13

June 16

September 14

June 17

September 15

June 18

September 16

June 19

September 17

June 20

September 18

June 21

September 19

June 22

September 20

$37.12

8

June 23

September 21

June 24

September 22

June 25

$52.03

12

September 23

June 26

September 24

June 27

September 25

June 28

September 26

June 29

September 27

June 30

September 28

$34.41

8

July 1

September 29

July 2

September 30

July 3

$46.33

8

October 1

July 4

October 2

July 5

October 3

July 6

October 4

July 7

October 5

$33.80

7

July 8

October 6

July 9

$47.09

6

October 7

$33.11

2

July 10

October 8

July 11

October 9

July 12

October 10

July 13

October 11

$30.02

4

July 14

October 12

July 15

October 13

July 16

$33.64

7

October 14

July 17

October 15

July 18

$48.01

2

October 16

July 19

October 17

July 20

October 18

July 21

October 19

July 22

October 20

July 23

October 21

July 24

October 22

July 25

October 23

$34.27

12

July 26

October 24

July 27

October 25

July 28

October 26

July 29

October 27

July 30

October 28

July 31

October 29

August 1

$49.18

14

October 30

August 2

October 31

$35.26

8

August 3

November 1

August 4

November 2

August 5

November 3

August 6

November 4

August 7

November 5

August 8

November 6

August 9

$43.21

8

November 7

August 10

November 8

$35.48

8

August 11

$44.23

2

November 9

The “# Days” columns are how many days it was between fillups.

So how do those compare? Let’s take a look:

Cavalier

Civic

Total:

$565.24

Total:

$433.80

Average Fillup:

$47.10

Average Fillup:

$33.37

Average Days Between Fillups:

8.09

Average Days Between Fillups:

6.85

Savings:

23%

I tried very hard to come up with a good graph, that could compare these numbers. (I know how much my blog readers love graphs.) The best I could come up with was this, where the red line represents gas spent on the Hybrid, and the blue line represents gas spent on the Cavalier:

Or maybe this works better, where again, the red area represents the Hybrid, and the blue area represents the Cavalier:

What you’ll notice, if you look at the numbers, is that I’m filling up the hybrid every 7 or 8 days, on average, except for some occasions where I’m filling up after only 2 or 3. This is because the mileage is much better in the city than on the highway; when I had to take long trips, that involved a lot of highway driving, I didn’t save as much on gas. For example, the weekend that I spent driving back and forth between Toronto, London, and Chatham. On that weekend, I had a fillup after only two days, and then another fillup four days later. (The car has a much smaller gas tank than my old car, which is why I had to fill up so frequently on these trips. I think the mileage would still be comparable to the old car—not less, but comparable.)

Why is the mileage so much better for city driving than highway driving? Well, here are some quick points on how the Honda hybrids work:

As opposed to some other hybrids, the gas motor is always on, for the Hondas. (See below for the exception to this rule.) When you accelerate—at any speed, not just at lower speeds—the electric engine kicks in, and helps the car accelerate. This way, the gas motor isn’t working as hard.

When the car slows down, it uses kinetic energy to charge the electric motor’s battery. This means that the car never has to be plugged in.

When you come to a stop, the gas motor shuts off, so that the car isn’t idling. When you take your foot off the brake, the gas motor comes back on, and by the time you’re ready to push your foot on the gas, the engine is ready to go.

That’s why the hybrid gets so much better mileage in the city than on the highway. With all of the stop and go, including the acceleration, and the fact that the engine can shut off, when you come to a stop, the hybrid technologies shine. When you’re on the highway, and maintaining a relatively stable speed, there isn’t much for the electric motor to do.

So, with this in mind, I decided to play with the numbers in the spreadsheet a bit. What would happen if I had only done city driving, and not taken any trips that involved a lot of highway driving? Then the numbers might have looked a bit more like this:

Civic Hybrid

Date

Gas

# Days

August 12

August 13

August 14

August 15

August 16

August 17

August 18

August 19

August 20

August 21

August 22

$32.29

11

August 23

August 24

August 25

August 26

August 27

August 28

August 29

$28.01

7

August 30

August 31

September 1

September 2

September 3

September 4

September 5

$35.07

7

September 6

September 7

September 8

September 9

September 10

September 11

September 12

$35.74

7

September 13

September 14

September 15

September 16

September 17

September 18

September 19

September 20

$37.12

8

September 21

September 22

September 23

September 24

September 25

September 26

September 27

September 28

$34.41

8

September 29

September 30

October 1

October 2

October 3

October 4

October 5

$33.80

7

October 6

October 7

October 8

October 9

October 10

October 11

$30.02

6

October 12

October 13

October 14

October 15

October 16

October 17

October 18

October 19

October 20

October 21

October 22

October 23

$34.27

12

October 24

October 25

October 26

October 27

October 28

October 29

October 30

October 31

$35.26

8

November 1

November 2

November 3

November 4

November 5

November 6

November 7

November 8

$35.48

8

November 9

(All I did was remove some of the fill ups, that were close to others, and then adjust the number of days accordingly. It’s not by any means scientific, just a “what if” scenario.)

Using these numbers, the comparison works out so that I would have saved about 34% on gas.

Cavalier

Civic

Total:

$565.24

Total:

$371.47

Average Fillup:

$47.10

Average Fillup:

$33.77

Average Days Between Fillups:

8.09

Average Days Between Fillups:

8.09

Savings:

34%

It’s only a coincidence that the average days between fillups ended up exactly 8.09, the same as for the Cavalier.

Still not the 50% that I would have hoped for, but better than I get with a lot of highway driving. If you’d like to see the graphic versions…

So that’s how the cars compare. 23%. I only saved 23% on gas.

While I’m posting about the Hybrid, I should mention how the cold affects it. A friend of mine was curious, so I’ll satisfy his curiosity. Remember the three points I mentioned about how the hybrid works? Well in the cold…

Acceleration is unaffected. As soon as you turn the car on, and start driving, the electric motor kicks in, and starts helping out when you accelerate.

When it comes to charging the electric motor’s battery, the car has to warm up a bit, before it will start charging. So when you start the car, in the cold, you’ll just be using up juice from the battery, and not replenishing any, for the first little while. (That being said, for any significant trip, the battery will get back to its fully charged state after a while.)

In terms of shutting off the gas engine, when at a complete stop, this doesn’t happen until the car gets fully warmed up. And even then, sometimes you get a “false stop” when the car is almost warmed up; that is, you’ll come to a stop, and you’ll feel the engine shut off for a second, and then it suddenly turns back on. It’s like the engine is saying, “Can I shut off? Yep. No wait! Not yet!”

Just to round off the post, here are some things about this car, that I’m noticing after driving it for a while:

The climate control system is great. It has an “auto” feature, where you simply put it to the temperature that you want, and it will take care of deciding when to turn the fan on, and how much, whether the air conditioning should be on or not, whether the air should come out at the windshield, or at your feet, or wherever, etc. It also tries to monitor the humidity in the car, and keep the A/C on when it gets too humid, so that the windows won’t fog up—although I notice that it doesn’t do this quite as well in the winter, so I have to override the “auto” setting and put the air pointing to the windshield, sometimes.

I’m absolutely loving the fact that the stereo plays MP3 CDs. That’s a very nice feature. (I’m sure all cars have that, these days.)

It took me a while to get used to the digital readout, for the speedometer, rather than the analogue gauge. (I’d still prefer the analogue gauge, I just got used to the digital readout.)

I didn’t notice it at first, but the Civic has a lot more room in the back seat than the Cavalier did. This is partly because the Civic doesn’t have the bump on the floor, where the middle passenger would sit. (I’m sure one of my gear-head readers will leave a comment and tell me what that lump is there for, on most cars, but the point is, it’s not there on mine, and my back seat passengers get more leg room because of it.)

You may be asking why I’m even bothering to put up a “movie review” for a movie that was made more than a decade ago. Two reasons:

Because I happened to be watching it on TV. (On Space?!? Why are they playing Last Action Hero on Space?)

To prove a point

My point is this: I post a lot of reviews of action movies, and say that I don’t like them. That they’re badly written, etc. etc. But I actually like this movie. It’s terrible, but I like it. (And it’s not just me who thinks it’s terrible; it only has a 33% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.)

I don’t even know why I like this movie. It’s clever, but only in a really superficial way. (Meaning that it’s not really clever; they only make the most obvious jokes, about the most obvious action movie clichés.) But I still find it entertaining.